It’s that time of the year again… PTA Coffee Talk on Tips for Parenting Teens. I have been invited to cover ‘the school perspective’ and our drug testing philosophy and policy. I consistently return to the same conclusion regarding where many problems develop from – clear, open communication. Find a problem and you’ll likely find, at its root, a breakdown in honest communication.

If the problem is so easily recognized, why is it such a problem? Are we really a species of atrocious communicators? I blame it on ego and emotions – a truly volatile mix for hormone charged teens! So! How do we parent our teens through these turbulent, stormy times? Here’s some tips I plan to share with out PTA:

Teach responsible decision-making to our teens.

There’s always a choice.

When it comes to partying, ask questions centered around these three words: Who, Where, and Expectations; ultimately leading to one of these three choices – stay sober; get drunk; do drugs.

e.g. Who is going to be there? Who is ‘responsible’? Who knows about the party and who doesn’t?; Where will the party be (in a house or hotel with ‘private’ rooms; in a club)? Where will the ‘responsible’ people be?; Are there expectations that the party will be short or long? What are the expectations re: drugs and alcohol?

Stay informed – first and foremost with your teen; other parents; the ‘net’; and, the school (teachers, counselors and principals all add to the picture)

Ultimately, we’re all in this together! We want a happy, healthy, successful teen – ready to take on the ‘real’ world.

I have always been a strong proponent of the value of character education in school. A large part of my role as Assistant Principal is dealing with student discipline issues, which can, at times, lead me to feeling quite cynical about human nature. I asked myself, the other day, if the rapid growth of social networking, multimedia and web technologies has (or should have) an impact on character education. I can’t answer the question. Good character is good character, right? Have web technologies changed our values? Maybe. I generally choose to look at technological developments as tools and yet, I do think that we are being shaped by our use of some of these tools and our standards for acceptable behaviour are impacted. What do you think? I’m very interested to know what others think.